WWMT is the CBS-affiliated television
station for West Michigan that is
licensed to Kalamazoo
. It broadcasts a high definition digital signal on
VHF channel 8 from a transmitter at Gun Lake
southeast of Wayland
along the
Barry
and Allegan
County line. Owned by
Freedom Communications, the station
has studios on West Maple Street in Kalamazoo.
Syndicated programming on WWMT
includes:
Wheel of
Fortune,
Jeopardy!,
Oprah, and
Dr. Phil.
The station operates
the area's CW affiliate on a second
digital
subchannel and Charter cable
channel 7. It gets the on-air branding,
CW
7, from the cable channel location.
WWMT is sister station
to Lansing
's ABC affiliate WLAJ
.
Although
that station has its own studios, master control and some
operations of itself and a CW subchannel
are located at WWMT's studios.
Digital television
The station's digital signal is multiplexed.
History
WWMT debuted on June 1, 1950 as
WKZO-TV
(
Kalama
zo
o). It
was West Michigan's second oldest television station and was owned
by broadcasting pioneer
John Fetzer
along with WKZO-AM 590 which he had launched in 1931.
WKZO initially had
reception problems due to the presence of WTMJ-TV
across
Lake
Michigan
in Milwaukee
that was also on channel 3. In 1953, WTMJ
moved to channel 4.
This, in turn, forced WBKB
in Chicago
to move from
channel 4 to channel 2 as a condition of its purchase by
CBS. In 1956, WKZO-AM-FM-TV moved to an old car dealership
on West Maple Avenue in Kalamazoo which has been the station's home
ever since.
It was the primary CBS affiliate by default
in the South
Bend
/ Elkhart
area in
northern Indiana
. This
served as a significant part of its advertising area before
northern Indiana got
UHF channels that dominate
that market and WKZO's signal was moved to a more northerly
location.
Channel 3 has been a primary CBS station from the very beginning
but initially had secondary affiliations with
NBC and
ABC. However, in 1960, Fetzer
built a new 1,100 foot (335
m) transmitter
near Gun Lake.
The new tower added Grand
Rapids
to its city-grade coverage and turned West Michigan
into a single television market. WKZO then shared ABC
with WOOD-TV
in Grand Rapids until WZZM
signed on in
1962. When John Fetzer owned the
Detroit Tigers baseball team, WKZO frequently
pre-empted prime time CBS broadcasting for Tigers baseball games
including preseason
exhibition.
Until it was dethroned by WZZM in the late-1970s (which was
outranked by WOOD-TV in the mid-1980s), WKZO was West Michigan's
top television station. In 1985, Fetzer retired and sold off his
vast broadcasting empire. The Fetzer television stations were
initially sold to
Gillett
Holdings.
However, due to
FCC ownership limits in
effect at the time, WKZO was spun off to Busse Broadcasting who
changed the call letters to the current WWMT
(
We're
West
Michigan
Television). For a time
in the mid-1990s, even though most of its fellow CBS affiliates
were in third place or worse, WWMT was number one. In 1995,
Granite Broadcasting acquired
the station. Freedom Communications purchased WWMT in 1998 from
Granite along with sister station WLAJ.
WWMT and WLNS
in Lansing
are the longest-serving CBS affiliates in the state of Michigan
(primarily due to WJBK
in Detroit
joining FOX). Although not owned by
the
CBS Corporation, WWMT has used
elements of the
CBS Mandate since the
mid-1990s. For example, the station's logos have used the CBS logo
and blue and gold as its colors since the mid-1990s, and since
2006, WWMT has branded itself as "CBS 3". On January 24, 2006,
The WB and
UPN announced
that they would end broadcasting and merge. The new combined
network would be called The CW. The letters would represent the
first initial of its corporate parents, CBS (the parent company of
UPN) and the
Warner Bros. unit of
Time Warner. On February 22,
News Corporation announced that they would
start up another new network called
MyNetworkTV.
This new service, which would be a sister network to FOX, would be
operated by
FOX Television
Stations and its syndication division,
Twentieth Television. MyNetworkTV was
created in order to give UPN and WB stations, not mentioned as
becoming CW affiliates, another option besides becoming
independent. It was also created to
compete against The CW. On April 4, WWMT announced that it would
launch a CW affiliate on a new second digital subchannel.
It was
reported that UPN affiliate WXSP-CA
was in talks to join The CW but due to the
station's heavy reliance upon prime-time professional sports (the
programming that gets the highest ratings on the channel) and The
CW's concerns over preemptive programming, the two sides could not
come to an agreement. As a result, West Michigan is one of
the largest television markets in which The CW is not available by
over-air broadcasts and one of the few to which the new network was
awarded to a station not affiliated with either The WB or UPN. WXSP
joined MyNetworkTV on September 5 when the network launched and
WWMT did the same with The CW when it launched on September 18.
From that date through early-December, WWMT-DT2 was known as "West
Michigan's CW". It has since been known as "CW 7". On
June 12, 2009, WWMT
moved to channel 8.
News operation
In addition to their main studios, WWMT operates two news bureaus.
One is
located in downtown Battle Creek
on Michigan Avenue West and there is also a
Shoreline Bureau. The station provides news and weather
updates for sister station WLAJ even though they don't have a news
department of their own. WWMT-DT2 airs the nationally syndicated
show,
The Daily Buzz, on
weekday mornings from 6 to 9. There is also a nightly 10 o'clock
newscast seen on that station known as
NewsChannel 3 Live at 10
on CW 7. WWMT's
weather radar is
called "
VIPIR 3D". Tom Van Howe filled in for
Jeff McAtee from July 28, 2008 until November. McAtee was on active
duty as a commander with the
United States Navy Reserve. WWMT
Marketing Director Mark Bishop told the
Grand Rapids Press that "McAtee will
be active in the Navy Reserve for a year or two." In November 2008,
Tom Van Howe extended his contract to continue on WWMT until at
least June 2009. He will continue to co-anchor the weeknight 5,
5:30, and 6 o'clock newscasts. Morning anchor Jeff Varner moved to
thr weeknight 11 o'clock broadcast alongside Judy Markee. WWMT
produces a local Friday night high school football replay show
known as
Football Fever that airs during the season.
News/Station Presentation
Newscast Titles
- News 3 (1980s-2006)
- NewsChannel 3 (2007-present)
Station Slogans
- Kalamazoo Direct to You (1960s)
- We're the Ones to See (1970s)
- TV Active 3 (1970s)
- We're West Michigan Television (1980s)
- Hello West Michigan (1985; used during period station
used Frank Gari's "Hello News")
- Share the Spirit of Channel 3 (1986-1987; localized
version of the CBS ad campaign)
- Channel 3 and You (1987-1994)
- Where News Comes First (1994-2006)
- Live, Local, Breaking News (2007-present)
News team
Current personalities
Anchors
- Josh Roe - weekday mornings and Noon
- Kate Tillotson - weekday mornings and Noon
- Tom Van Howe - weeknights at 5, 5:30, and 6
- Judy Markee - weeknights at 5, 5:30, 6, and 11
- Jeff Varner - weeknights at 10 and
11
- weeknight 5, 5:30, and 6 o'clock reporter
- Holly Doyle - weekends and reporter three days a week
Severe Weather Center 3 Meteorologists
Sports
- Ed Kengerski - Director seen weeknights at 6, 10, and 11
- Andy Pepper - weekends and reporter
Reporters
- Jessica Wheeler
- David
Bailey - Grand
Rapids and Lakeshore
- Ranji Sinha
- Tim Ragones
- Carolyn Wyllie
- Jared Werksma
Former personalities
References
-
http://www.wwmt.com/articles/transition_1358902___article.html/newschannel_deadline.html
-
http://www.wwmt.com/news/newschannel_1351469___article.html/well_howe.html
-
http://blog.mlive.com/chronicle/2008/07/longtime_tv_anchor_coming_out.html
- http://www.freedom.com/company/full_news2.asp?id=1357
External links
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AZ
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Ohio
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